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Not Saving The World? How Does That Even Work?

Over at Tor.com, Jo Walton notices no one 'saves the world' in Scott Lynch's excellent Lies of Locke Lamora series:

Where saving the world came into fantasy was with The Lord of the Rings, and where Tolkien got it from was from Christianising Ragnarok. In Norse Mythology, the world is going to be destroyed and that’s all there is to it. It’s the inevitable end. There are versions where a couple of Thor’s sons will survive to see a new world, but in any case, this world that we love and care about will end in battle and destruction and dead heroes will rise again to fight at the side of the gods and be destroyed again and that’s the end. It’s inevitable. It’s always there. In writing LOTR Tolkien went with this kind of end of everything—if Sauron wins, there won’t even be anyone left to sing songs or tell stories. The ultimate victory of good, which happens through the operation of grace and not through the will (never mind power) of the heroes, is Tolkien’s Christianising of this deeply pagan myth. It was a very original thing to do, that eucatastrope.